What kind of coffee drinker are you? Do you drink flavored coffee or content yourself with Folgers every morning? Or are you the type who only drinks espresso brewed by a properly trained barista but would rather grind and brew coffee fresh at your own house, just the way you like it? If you are the latter type, then the AeroPress is for you. The distinct winner of our taste tests, the AeroPress narrowly missed winning our Editor's Choice award because its weight and multiple pieces makes it more difficult to bring along on camping excursions than the Hario V60 Plastic Dripper or the Melitta Ready Set Joe. Once you learn how to use the AeroPress, it is not very complicated, the clean-up is easy, and it allows you to brew a perfect cup every time. With its unique high pressure brew process, many a coffee fanatic has switched over to using this coffee maker whether outside or indoors.

OutdoorGearLab Editors' Hands-on Review

Brew Features

The AeroPress is a unique coffee maker that uses a high pressure press resulting in essentially shots of espresso instead of a typical brewed coffee. Whereas many other coffee makers drip water into the center of a bed of grounds, under-brewing at the edges, the AeroPress uniformly extracts coffee from the grounds to provide a rich, bitterness-free coffee.

Taste

The coffee from this maker has a low-acidity and extremely clean, rich taste. In our taste tests this maker outperformed all the others.

Ease of Use

Unfortunately, the AeroPress involves a more elaborate process than any of the other coffee makers. Here are quick step-by-step instructions; more detailed information comes with the maker or can be found on their website.

Insert microfilter into cap.

Screw cap onto chamber.

Place chamber on cup.

Add coffee. (One scoop for each desired shot of espresso.)

Add hot water. (To the fill line corresponding to the number of scoops.)

Stir for 10 seconds.

Press gently until all water has been pushed through.

Either drink as espresso, add milk for a latte, or hot water for an Americano.

Weight

The press by itself weighs 7.98 ounces, which isn't exactly lightweight. If you include the extras, like the spoon and the stirrer, then it weighs 9.39 ounces. This would not be the choice for a backpacker who is limiting the pounds. But for a car-camper who wants a gourmet morning, this is perfect.

Portability

It is not all that large or heavy, so the AeroPress is portable. However, it is made up of multiple little pieces that can be hard to keep track of. To make it easy to keep everything together when heading on a camping trip, the Press even comes with a bag to keep all of the pieces in.

Best Application

This press is so wonderful that our reviewer uses it for making coffee every day at home. It also works well for car-camping or traveling, but is not ideal for backpackers.

Personal Stories

During this coffee maker test we went to some professionals for advice. We questioned the roaster, barista, and owner of Black Velvet Coffee in Mammoth Lakes, CA, to discover his favorite method for serving up caffeine while camping. Turns out he uses the AeroPress. "It allows you to use exact amounts of coffee and water, which results in a pure tasting coffee. Also it has an easy cleanup, unlike a French Press. I bring this with me when I travel overseas to ensure that I can get good coffee wherever I am."

Value

For $30, this is much more expensive than some of the other camping coffee makers on the market. However, it provides you with the best tasting coffee of all of them, so it can be worth it. The AeroPress is the same price as the GSI Personal Press, but it is a better tasting, easier-to-clean system.

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I've had this remarkable plastic piece of heaven for a couple years now. I'll tell ya, my first year was full of growing pains with some odd and, apparently, extremely rare problems with my press. The coffee it produces is the best I've ever had, owing a lot to being freshly made, but mostly to the method of brewing. The coffee is incredibly consistent and flexible in the strength by letting you choose both the amount of water and coffee. I've raved about this device and always will. Now, as stated, I've had problems and this is what is really remarkable. I called for a warranty issue within the first year and was immediately sent a replacement. The second year, same problem and was again immediately sent a replacement. Aerobie asked me to keep in touch after sending a revised replacement material and I did. I had compressed my plunger by storing it inside the chamber, without knowing this was possible, and was sent another plunger at no cost after contacting them! OMG, where have you ever heard of anything like this? Nowhere, that's where! I have actually had real live conversations with several people from the company and have even emailed back and forth. These people are truly dedicated to their product, customers and your experience. I can, without any reservation, recommend this product and the company. You will not regret it and if you have any problems I am certain you'll be satisfied with the results. Promise!

As far a backpacking goes, if you take anything but Starbucks Via, you're wasting fuel, space, time and weight. Taking a coffee maker on a lightweight backpacking trip is silly when you can have pretty damn good coffee in a tiny packet. BTW, I HATE Starbucks and will never ever buy their coffee when there is any alternative. However, they've done a good job of making an instant coffee that isn't spew so I can stoop just low enough to buy a box of Via if I need lightweight, convenient coffee.

Second, buy the stainless disc to replace the paper filters if you want the best coffee. Thewy make it bit more of a pain to clean but the coffee is better.

Third, my only reservation about the Aeropress is that it doesn't fit in to the mouths of some of the travel mugs and thermoses I own, particularly the Kleen Kanteen. Bummer.

Fourth, if you close your eyes, you won't miss the crema that an $8,000 professional espresso machine will leave on the top of your demitasse.

Used my aeropress on a trip to Big Bend this week. Gourmet coffee while looking at the Chisos mountains heaven!Did take a little time to get it right since I like strong coffee. I pour the hot water over the grounds, stir, let the water drain into the cup, then add more water before forcing the water through the grounds. Doing it this way gave me a pefrect cup everytime.

I've never used it camping though it would be great for that purpose however the system is a little bulky and probably not best for backpacking.

I use mine at home. It makes a GREAT cup of coffee and it's relatively easy to use but there is a slight learning curve. Once you master it, you'll never look at a drip coffee maker the same way again.

Also, I will say, despite the claim, this does not make espresso. The coffee you get is more like a French Press but a little more filtered due to the paper filter discs required. There is a reusable metal screen filter that will get you much closer to FP coffee and would work great camping/backpacking since there would not be any trash produced as there would be with the paper filter, even though that is bio-degradable.

I gave it 4/5 because of the size (based on using it for camping/backpacking) and that it can be a little tricky to use. There are some great youtube videos on using the system and some tricks that you can do to improve the use and results.

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